February 14, 2018
Stephanie is baptized! y ¡Carnival!
February 14, 2018
STEPHANIE. This past week we were hoping and praying that Stephanie, who we have been teaching, who is the girlfriend of a brother in our ward, would not leave on her trip across the world before he scheduled baptism date. She has no idea when exactly she will get the call to head out so she is prepared everyday to leave. BUT nothing happened and we had the baptismal service and wow! Super cool. There was even cake after the baptism, so people were whispering, “wow, it looks like a wedding reception or something similar” But no such thing happened. She was baptized by her grandpa who is a Patriarch and had been called to be the stake president of 3 different stakes at different points in time. We sat there wondering why Stephanie wasn’t a member. For the parents, who aren’t members, she wasn’t. But they were there! Sweet! All went super well. I know, that she didn’t just get baptized because of a boyfriend or something. She asked the deepest questions until the end. When she heard about tithing. I saw here contemplate it for a bit, take a deep breath after she felt a bit of the spirit, and said ok, I will do it.
FRED. We had a new member who introduced himself as pretty inactive but recovering, We’ll call him Fred. He is 28ish and was baptized 5ish years earlier. We are helping him along because he went through a lot when he went inactive. The darkest moments of his life including psychology treatment. Wow. When someone wants so badly to find that peace that they had lost and try to regain it by their own means, it feels like an empty box. The box is there but nothing is inside. Same with him right now. He is at church but is unsure why. So we have given him a new insight on how to read the scriptures. The scriptures are not just stories. I repeat, the scriptures are not just stories. They are the words of God and are that we can relate them to our lives to apply to our lives. To apply to our lives is key. He read and read but never applied. So he was left confused and lost and spiritually hungry. Like the vision of Lehi and Nefi talks about. We hope he will hold the iron rod, the word of God to fill his empty box with the light of the gospel.
CARNIVAL. honestly, we didn’t see anything happen around, so me. But hey people say that in the south, people go absolutely LOCO so watch out if you head south anytime soon in Guayaquil! What they do here is they look out for anyone that looks like they might be able to throw water balloons, colored powder, silly string, and these canisters that they sell here that fire colored foam or something at anything and anyone that passes in the street. At least that is what I have heard. But we, we were mandated to stay in the apartment for those to days to make sure that no one would do something similar to us. So, I studied.
STUDY. Wow. Goals are pretty awesome. While reading the Book of Mormon aloud in Spanish, I set a goal that within the two days that we had that I would read 100 pages! So I read and read and read and I did it! After reading for a whole afternoon until 9 in the night, my head hurt. Something that I tried a bit was reading along with the audio of the Book of Mormon, wow that is sincerely difficult. Some verses, I could say every word without falling behind but others, my mouth just wouldn’t move fast enough. Afterward I found myself using other forms of words that I hadn’t read but I could feel for what the correct word was. Oh how wonderful are the words of Spanish combined with the words of God.
Well that concludes this week, but also my birthday was this week. It was a simple birthday. I got some Nutella and we ate that. And also Elder Tafur made us some scrumptious hamburgers. They are called Completos because they put a fried egg in the Hamburger too! Surprisingly delicioso!
¡Until Later, Hasta Luego!
Elder Wilhelm
6 Meses is not a Mess, it is amazing!
1/2 a week here, then CRAB
We worked hard and it was worth it!
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